A Movie the Horror-Genre has Needed for a Long Time

Rating: Null/10 (16 October 2014)

First and foremost, if you haven't seen this movie - Go see it! Now! If you're a fan of horror movies in general, you can't complete the genre without it.
Regardless of how good any single horror movie was before 28 Days Later, they all seemed to steer in a few major directions; in that they either aimed at creating the best jump-scares, the most realistic violence/gore, creepy bad guys, or cringing suspense. At the end of the day, you could look back and say, "Thank God it's just a movie." They were all caught up on creating a surreal scenario that was then brought as close to reality as they could get. Primarily, every movie had a key person/place/thing that, once on screen, you knew it was time to be scared, and in between scenes you could take a breath.
28 Days Later goes in the opposite direction; throwing the notion of any key person/place/thing to be scared of out the window, and instead creates a living atmosphere to the entire movie that keeps you tight-fisted the entire way through.
The greatest thing is that instead of trying to be preachy, or pulling at you emotionally through character development, it's the empty scenery, the sometimes purposeful lack of music or sound effects, the lack of relief, the lack of heroes, the silence, and the unknown that create more eeriness and emotional helplessness than any amount of blood, gore, terror, killers, or zombies ever could on their own.
No matter what horror movie left the most memorable impression on you before, this movie will add a new category to those impressions that have you looking at horror movies from a different perspective.
However, the reason for giving it an 8 out of 10 over a perfect score is that although the movie begins insanely strong, and stays there throughout nearly the entire movie, there are some seriously out of place detached plot/scene/character/pacing changes that happen between the last 1/4th of the movie and the near-end (although it does get back on track before the actual ending). It's not enough detachment to undo the impact of everything else in the movie, but gives you that sense of "bleh, please tell me it won't be like this for the rest of the movie" (if that makes sense to you).
Those who may not be fans of the horror genre, or are interested in this movie simply because "yay it's a zombie movie", you *must* reset your expectations before seeing this. That does not mean this movie will disappoint you at all! It simply means it can not be forcefully lumped into either of those categories, and will give you a new perspective on what you thought a zombie horror movie could be.
If you're still on the fence about seeing this, and you've read this far, then stop reading reviews and go watch it !